


The Wolf and His Raven

by Whispering_Sumire



Series: TW Bingo♘ [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Peter Hale, Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Choices, Demigod Stiles Stilinski, Destiny, Dreams, Dreamsharing, Falling In Love, Fighting, First Kiss, Fluff, Getting Together, Good Peter Hale, Icelandic Pet Names, Love Confessions, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Minor Character Death, Raven Stiles Stilinski, Swordfighting, The Dreaming, The Hale Family, The Hale Fire, Werecreature Stiles, or sorta something like that, you'll see - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-04-17 21:09:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14197743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whispering_Sumire/pseuds/Whispering_Sumire
Summary: "Peter Hale," the boy chimes, his voice all tender clever sweet-steel, "Hello.""Where am I?" He asks, and his own voice is hard to come by, sounds slow like creeping sludge even to his own ears."You are in my home, child." Is the answer he is given, and he would bristle at the name, he thinks, were it not soobvioushow much older this being is than he."Why?""You should ask that question of yourself, ungi úlfur. I didn't invite you in, you walked through the Dreaming to get here."[Or: The one where Stiles is actually kind of a God, and Peter befriends him almost entirely by accident.]





	The Wolf and His Raven

The room glows with the firelight in the hearth, all flickering gold against oak and cherry wood. Peter thinks it's a cabin, all he knows is he can feel warmth on the soles of his feet, can hear the small shift-stick sound of gloss-clean floor boards as he takes a tentative step forward and glimpses a hall. There's an arch at the very end, and that way lay light, lay fire, lay something open and _visible_. He is a wolf, the darkness doesn't scare him, but he is every ounce a curious and inquisitive being.

So he follows the hall down, out into a living room that is bright and earth-tones, with a fire-place and velvet-emerald sofa chairs and a round wicker table that seats four vermillion-cushioned white-birch chairs that seem almost out of place against the dark chocolate russet forest tones that hold everywhere else he looks.

A boy, around the same age as he, sits in one of the chairs, squinting at the cards fanned out in his hands. Only, he's not a boy per se, not entirely.

Instead of hair, he has feathers, a slicked down adornment of long, gorgeous, silky looking things, a dark twilight color that gleams in the dim light offered. His skin is milk-cream supple, sprinkled with cinnamon freckles, and his eyes- framed by mini-feather fluff rather than eyelashes, which should look odder and more alien than it does, but Peter, somehow, just finds it charming- are sun-soaked black-tea, twinkling with mischief and a terrifying sort of wisdom that burns just as steady-sure as that fire does.

When the befeathered boy sets his cards down Peter sees his claws, longer and sharper and darker than any wolves, a shining onyx that contrasts against long, delicate, fair fingers. And his cute upturned nose, his plush pink lips, his smile, soft, charming, angelic.

"Peter Hale," the boy chimes, his voice all tender clever sweet-steel, "Hello."

"Where am I?" He asks, and his own voice is hard to come by, sounds slow like creeping sludge even to his own ears.

"You are in my home, child." Is the answer he is given, and he would bristle at the name, he thinks, were it not so _obvious_ how much older this being is than he.

"Why?"

"You should ask that question of yourself, ungi úlfur. I didn't invite you in, you walked through the Dreaming to get here."

"What _are_ you?"

"I am a raven. And you are a wolf," he answers, like it's that simple, but it isn't, Peter can feel it in his bones, and his eyes narrow at the boy, who's looked down to inspect his cards again. When he catches Peter's look, he laughs, full of delight and tranquility. "Come sit with me," he suggests, all kind host full of welcome, "I haven't had anyone to play with in a dog's age and you will do quite nicely."

Peter simmers with questions and confusion and irritation, but he finds himself in one of the chairs, seated across from the befeathered boy between one blink and the next anyway.

"I didn't-- How did I?"

"You're not awake, ungi úlfur, one foot still in the Dreaming and one foot in my Realm. As soon as you decided to sit, you were sitting. As soon as you decided to play," the boy gestures at the cards- which are large plasticy things with detailed pictures on them, their backs interweaved lines of varying blues- that are now in Peter's hands, "you were playing."

"But I didn't--" Peter begins, because he _hadn't_ , he hadn't decided anything, he's sure. Maybe. Right?

"Oh, you did," the boy grins at him, deliberates over his hand, sets a Queen on the table.

"I don't even know how to play."

"You will, Peter, you will."

* * *

"Hello again, ungi úlfur!" The raven boy crows upon seeing him the next night, the second time Peter's apparently 'wandered in from the Dreaming', whatever the hell that means.

They're not inside this time, and his bare-feet sink into muddy-wet soil, his toes curl uncomfortably. They're on a hill standing in dew-soaked grass that's as tall as their hips, and softer than it should be, lighter, too, a washed out, bleached sort of green. The sun hangs heavy in the sky, but it isn't hot or cold, just that same comforting warmth.

Peter thinks he can see a sturdy little ivy-covered cabin in the distance, with smoke billowing out of it's chimney.

"Ungi úlfur... You called me that last time."

"It's Icelandic," the boy agrees and answers his unasked question, both.

"Are _you_ Icelandic? Some sort of mythological creature?" Peter asks as he watches the boy weave a glittering steel sword around, practicing elegant moves that twist him around and around ceaselessly, a vicious, murderous facsimile of a dance.

His feathers spin around with him, match the swishing sound of his blade as it cuts through invisible foes. Claws clink against a disgustingly bright sugar-orange marble handle. Lithe-svelt body wearing an honestly outrageously modern outfit, considering, and with no taste. You'd think him in a medieval tunic or perhaps a suit, but no. A t-shirt with some obscure reference overlayed with plaid and a red hoodie, jeans, neon-green vans.

Part of Peter wants to rehaul his wardrobe.

Part of Peter thinks that giving a dreamed up figment of his imagination/ mythological creature a makeover is the first sign of likely insanity and therefore something he might want to _avoid_.

"No and yes," the boy tells him, not even breathless, "and you really need to come up with better questions. For instance: ask me who I am."

"I _did_."

" _No_ , you asked me _what_ I am, there's a difference." The boy flicks his wrist, twirling his sword once more before he plants the tip of it in the dirt, crossing his wrists over the top of the handle and resting his chin on them, eying Peter with a speculative sort of amusement.

"Okay," Peter says warily, "who are you?"

"I am many things, my Master gave me Dominion over Decisions and Choices, over Pathways and Crossroads, over Chance," his eyes flash a startling, sharp, shamrock-green and for one ridiculous second, Peter is actually reminded of Leprechauns, "over Luck, the day he gifted me speech.

"I will not yet tell you my True Name, for those are powerful things, but you may call me... Mischief." And his eyes sparkle with delight at that, he's grinning, now, like he's won something.

"Mischief," Peter repeats, incredulous, then: "Are you a God?"

Mischief guffaws, his feathers sway in the light breeze.

"No. I've had my fill of Gods, and most of the good ones are long since dead. No, I'm just a raven with-" he pulls his sword out of the earth with a light flourish, and then a bow- "a little _extra_."

Peter narrows his eyes at him, "Or just a very _vivid_ dream."

"You wound me, ungi úlfur. You truly do. Now, come, I'll teach you how to best the greatest swordsmen in battle." Mischief's grin is wide and wicked.

"I know a hunter who favors swords," Peter says, thinking of Gerard even as a sword, different, the blade wider and shorter, the handle blood-red, appears dutifully in his hand. "Uses them to cut our kind in _half_."

"All the better!" Mischief cries, twirling into a blow that Peter tries to parry, and fails horribly, the befeathered boy easily knocking him down, defenseless, "Know thy enemy and what not. Come on, up! I'll show you what you did wrong just then..."

* * *

Talia finds her little brother in the basement library, reading Icelandic and Norse dictionaries, with books on the culture and mythos of both all around him.

"Do you think Gods are real, Tal?" He asks her without looking up from his reading.

She bites her lip, studying him for a moment. She's felt wrong-footed around him ever since she inherited Alphahood from her father two months ago, her Bond with him the least formed, the most watered-down. She wonders if it's because he envies her her post, or if maybe her husband is right. Maybe something's just _wrong_ with him.

"I don't know," she tells him eventually. "I mean, we deal with Fey and Omegas and Witches and any number of supernatural oddities on a daily basis in order to keep Beacon Hills, the Nemeton, _safe_. Not to mention the fact that _we're_ supernatural oddities ourselves," Peter snorts, and she smiles at him, the familiarity of just being his big sister lifting the weight, the _doubts_ , in her heart some, "so they could be. I wouldn't know unless I met one. Why?"

"I think I might've," he murmurs, then shakes his head and makes a frustrated noise as he slams his book shut. Talia flinches at the aggressiveness of the movement. "Or maybe not. Maybe it's just a dream. Ugh, I don't know."

"Well," she tries to soothe, "you're sixteen, you're bound to be having lots of dreams. Your brain is full of hormones and all that knowledge you've built up _'Mommy's little Genius'_ ," Peter tries to repress a grin at that, he fails, "so, who knows? Maybe it's a God, maybe it's a-"

"-an overactive imagination?" Peter finishes questioningly, wry and wan, and she laughs.

"It could go either way really."

"That's my problem," he sighs, but he's smiling, and he's going back to his book, so she's going to call it a win.

She'll worry about him more some other day.

* * *

* * *

Talia is bewildered and incredulous, and just a little gratified to see her brother, twenty-four, now, deftly knock the sword out of some Gerard lackey hunter's hands with his claws before- to her extreme surprise- picking up the weapon and handling it as if he were _born_ to it.

Within seconds he's whisked his way around all fourteen of the men who ganged up on them, and incapacitated them all. And the way he _moves_ , with grace and poise, all fleet-footed avenging angel, dancing and careful and _practiced_. It's breath-taking. Well, so is the wolf's bane bullet lodged in her gut, but she's trying not to think about that right now.

"Where did you--" she pants when the last man is down and Peter's dropped his sword before rushing over to her, already getting powder out of one of the hunter's bullets- "learn how to...?"

"I've had a good teacher," Peter grits out, digging a lighter out of his pocket and setting the small fire before pressing it to her wound. She groans with the agony of it, reaches out with a hand that Peter instantly grips. "Apparently you can learn sword fighting in dreams, even if you've only been having them on and off for eight years. I also know how to play poker and rummy with tarot cards."

"Do you, now?" Talia half-laughs, half-chokes.

"Come on Tal, let's get you out of here."

* * *

Peter sits in the now familiar birch-wood chair, watches Mischief tend to the pot of soup set to boil above his steady-burning fire. The befeathered boy hasn't aged a day since he's met him, not physically, anyway. But Peter gets the distinct impression that time passes differently for him.

He knows that Mischief is lonely. It's so easy to see, the desperate way he tries to babble about every single thing- all frenetic urgency- the way he tries to teach every game and story and weapon he knows like he's afraid that when Peter leaves he won't come back and he's trying to give up as much of himself as he can before the wolf goes. The way he leans into every touch that Peter's ever offered. The way he smiles, terror and _sadness_ , deep and profound in his eyes, always resigned.

And he knows, that when he dreams of this place again after months of dreaming of nothing, Mischief looks half-dead before his eyes light on Peter, and he always brightens, always lights up from the inside, beatific and pure and selfless, just for him.

He knows that the boy smells like feathers and wind, like ancient libraries and vanilla beans, like tears, like something small, animal, primal, prey. Fragile. Hopeless. His depression lingers on his skin and sours the edges of his smell even as he becomes incredibly joyful just at the sight of Peter.

He has somehow gained such a powerful, loyal, devoted friend, just by the simple act of dreaming, and yesterday that realization wouldn't have mattered, but today, today it knocks him breathless.

"I beat over a dozen hunters today," Peter says, watching the raven's reaction. It's immediate, but not exactly what he expects. Between one moment and the next Mischief goes from his cooking to Peter's side, framing Peter's face with soft hands that tremble lightly with something like worry.

"And you're okay? Out _there_ , I mean. In the real world? You're not here because you're unconscious or something, are you? Peter if you're hurt, I-"

Peter cuts him off, laughing half exasperatedly as he shakes his head and moves to capture Mischief's hands in his own, pulling them away from his cheeks and down to his chest, his heartbeat.

" _Breathe_ , lítill guð. I said I beat _them_ , not the other way around."

Mischief takes a deep breath, leans down to press his forehead to Peter's temple, feathers grazing Peter's cheek tickle-soft. Then he slips his hands out of Peter's and smacks his shoulder, "I hate it when you call me that. I am by no means a God. _And_ I'm not even _little_."

Peter snickers as Mischief moves back to the fire, reattending himself to the food, which smells fucking mouth-watering, and Peter really wishes he were permitted to eat it, but he's been lectured enough on why you're not supposed to ever _ever_ eat faerie food and how food in the Dreaming is a close enough cousin that it should be avoided at all costs that he knows not to ask. Opening that particular can of worms is never pleasant.

"What would you have me call you then? And I think you're selling yourself short."

"By what count! And I'd have you call me my _name_ , thank you."

"I might remind you that I don't actually _know_ your name."

The befeathered boy shoots a narrow-eyed glare over his shoulder at him, Peter studies his cuticles innocently. "Fjandinn klár rass," Mischief mutters, and Peter grins before he can help himself.

"Why did you bring this up, anyway? You must've had a reason beyond worrying me _needlessly_ ," the raven grouses, petulant.

"I did it with a _sword_ , and the only way I could've done that is because I learned it from _you_ ," Peter says, and Mischief stills, "which means two things. One," he ticks off a finger, "I need to thank you, lítill guð, you might be the only reason my sister and I lived through today. Two," he ticks off another, "you are very, _very_ real."

They're both quiet for a moment, Mischief seemingly frozen in some sort of shock. After a long, long while the boy resumes stirring his soup and says in a small, rough little voice, "I kept telling you I was."

"I never believed you," Peter murmurs.

"I know," Mischief whispers.

* * *

Peter finds Mischief in a room upstairs, part of the cabin he's never actually explored before. The boy is on a bed that looks tribal, looks like it belongs in some movie with Vikings and war-cries and hour-long battles that are played out in gruesome detail, a large cot-like thing covered in various large furs and leathers all cured and serving as blankets and bundled up with braided threads to serve as pillows.

Mischief is curled up in the middle of it all, shivering, sweating, whimpering, his cheeks tear-stained and his mouth pulled into a grimace, he smells of moldy paper and stifling hot desert air, he smells _sick_. His fists tighten in the furs as he grits his teeth against a scream, his whole body straining against some phantom pain.

"Oh, sweetheart," Peter murmurs, rushing to his side, placing his hand on Mischief's, wishing fervently that he could take the pain away, but unlike with most other things, the dream-like quality of this Realm does not grant his wish, "what's wrong? What is this?"

Mischief pants, flutters his eyes open, hand turning from where it's fisted in his sheets to lace their fingers together. He smiles, it's as bright and joyful as it is strained and tear-soaked and wretched, "Dýrmæti úlfurinn minn... Ó elskan mín, dýrmæti úlfur."

"Mischief," Peter whispers, choked and heart-sick, because he knows enough of the language by now to know what he's saying, but it's more than that. It's how he _said_ it, how he seems to be in _agony_ and still he blooms, shines with open, clear, selfless, vulnerable _joy_ for Peter, simply because he's _there_. Peter squeezes the hand in his, brings his other hand up to caress a supple, tear-stained cheek. Brushes the new tears that come away with the pad of his thumb as Mischief nuzzles into the contact, whimpers, shivers, whines as another wave of pain rolls over him.

"Ég elska þig með allri sálu minni," the befeathered boy says, and Peter's eyes go wide, his breath hitches, Mischief just turns his head a little with a sniffle, kisses the palm of Peter's hand, soft and chaste and _innocent_ , "dýrmæti úlfur."

"Jesus, you can't just _say_ things like that. Not when you're like this. Not when I can't say it _back_."

Peter stays with him like that for what feels like hours, as he writhes and screams and pants, holding his hand, caressing his cheek, unable to do anything else but _watch_. Then, abruptly, the raven's demeanor changes, shifts, becomes just that slightest bit more aware, and black-tea amber eyes set on him, terrified, determined.

"Peter," Mischief breathes, a trembling, shaking, clawed hand covering his on the boy's cheek, and he speaks urgently, gritting it out through the pain "something's going to happen, someone close to you is about to make a choice. It's a fork in the road, whatever they decide, it changes your Pack's destiny forever." Mischief fights back a scream, groans and flinches and convulses, then, weak and wobbling with fatigue and the aftermath of what he's enduring, "Promise me, promise me you'll try to keep him from making the wrong choice?"

Peter blinks, confused, barely able to comprehend, but he can already feel the dream fading, and he doesn't have _time_.

"Okay," he says, and he kisses Mischief's sweat-slick forehead, squeezes his hand one last time. "Okay, I promise."

* * *

Peter's furious, grief-stricken, unable to really think _calmly_ when he becomes aware in his normal chair, sitting across the table from Mischief who sits, morose, hunched, eyes steadfastly on his lap.

"Why didn't you _tell_ me?!" Peter growls, half shouts, delirious with bitter rage.

"I couldn't, not all of it. I did try-"

" _Fuck_ you! You told me someone close to me would make a choice, I would've guessed Talia what with her meetings and treaties, but you said _he_ , so it was pretty easy to figure out _who_ , but I couldn't find out _what_ , and then I realized: The girl. The stupid girl Derek's been _mooning_ over. So I advised him, like I _promised_ you I would!

"I tried to get him to tell her about us, to tell her what we were, I was already pretty sure she would take it well, but that _idiot_ went and asked an Alpha to _turn her_ instead! And Talia forgave him, of course she would, anyone would, it was a stupid, terrible, childish mistake, but she _blames_ me! They _both_ do, Mischief."

"I would've given you more, Peter," Mischief tries, Peter's already standing, had started pacing during his rant, but the raven stays in his chair, though he does look up now, devastation and concern mingling in his sun-soaked black-tea eyes, "but I was breaking the Old Laws already. Any more and I could've died. Besi-"

"No! Screw that! Who gave you the right to all of this knowledge, and then told you you couldn't use it to help anyone? I know you Mischief, I know you've lived a _long_ , long life. And now, she won't ever get the chance. She was a _little girl_ , just a little girl in love with a _foolish_ boy, and she did not deserve to die like that."

"I know, dýrmæti úlfur, I-"

" _Don't_. Don't call me that."

"Peter..." And he looks so lost, so fucking hopeless, but Peter doesn't _care_ , he can take all his teachings and his lonely and his _riddles_ somewhere _else_ , to _someone_ else. He doesn't want it. He doesn't want _any_ of it anymore.

"I can't even look at you right now," Peter says, and Mischief's eyes go wide, shine with tears and hurt, his whole body flinches in on itself like he's been struck, and then he and his cabin and all of his mystery disappear like mist or smoke.

Peter dreams of nothing but darkness for the rest of the night.

* * *

Over the next year Peter ignores any and all attempts Mischief makes to contact him in his dreams. He ignores distant memories of a murmured: _'Bíddu, ekki fara.'_

He divorces himself from the dream-raven completely, even when the boy invades his dreams and tells him in insistent and urgent tones, as he coughs up blood and bile in his fight to do so, that something _bad_ is going to happen, that he needs to watch Derek, stop him.

The first time Peter listened to him a girl died, and Peter's not about to make that mistake again.

When the fire happens, and everyone is screaming and burning and Talia is roaring as she futilely scratches at the tunnel door, he thinks, hating himself just a little, resenting Mischief fust a little, that he should've fucking listened.

What is the point of a grudge when you're about to die, after all?

* * *

Trapped within his mind, abandoned by his new Alpha and her one _healthy_ Beta, Peter is lost, burning, reliving screams of terror and horror and agony, reliving the pleas for help, the way the children _cried_. The scent of melting flesh, of blood and smoke and tears and singed hair clings to his nose, drowns out the antiseptic and the sickly-crisp scents of the hospital.

On the fourth week he thinks he sees a raven, an actual raven, land on his window-sill. And it looks at him with such sorrow and such deep-seated affection, that for just one second, one blissful second, he comes back to himself, his wolf, a big, angry, restless thing in his mind, has been eating him alive, he _knows_ it has, and some part of him is _letting_ it, too tired to fight the fury, the fire that has burned him down to his very core, the pull to unsheathe his claws and just _destroy_.

But for one blissful moment, the screams of his family, of his _Pack_ , are overwhelmed by fuzzy dream-soft memories of a little cabin and his lítill guð.

He thinks he hears the raven say, "I'm so sorry, dýrmæti úlfur. I am _so_ sorry."

And then he blinks.

And the raven is gone.

* * *

The wolf has waited six years, hating, burning, twisted and callous and broken and trapped within himself. So when his Alpha comes, he does not wish to speak, to listen, she left him, bait and switch, alone, terrified, vulnerable to hunters and this _place_. And he knows she will only leave him again, leave him to his nightmares and to unforgiving mother moon, he knows she will not take the vengeance that is rightfully theirs and she will _leave him_.

And he wants to _heal_.

He wants to run in the woods and howl to mother moon just to show her that he's _free_ , he wants claws and teeth enough that he can find all the human-hunter-people behind the burning of his Pack, the reason he hears screams every night and feels his skin melt under heat every day. He wants them all to suffer.

He wants abandonment-Alpha-cruel-never-touch to suffer.

And he knows her vermillion eyes, her power, her Alphahood is a strong sanctified thing, knows it'll sing in his bones and settle with the land and free him from the scorch-terror-twilight of his mind.

So the wolf crawls after her, finds her in the woods, and she's so surprised by him she never sees it coming. The wolf smiles as it sheds human form, gains mobility, gains power, gains eyes as red as the blood he gurgles on when he howls his triumph to the moon and her children-stars.

The wolf needs Pack, cannot trust the small Pack-bond he feels slip into the back of his mind that leads to a wolf too far away, a wolf unloyal, a wolf who knows nothing.

So he takes half of ex-Alpha's corpse into his mouth and drags it closer to home-den-territory-char-grave. He leaves it exposed. Waits for someone worthy to find it, for someone he can claim as Beta to find what made him Alpha.

* * *

There comes two, both boys, one with floppy hair and rasping breaths and anxiety all sticking to his skin, he smells like _prey_ , life soft-meat, he will be easy to manipulate, to mold into what the wolf needs from a Beta.

But then he sees the other, black-tea eyes, closely shorn brown hair where there should be _feathers_ , and he doesn't smell like prey. He smells like fight and ancient libraries vast with knowledge and lore, he smells like a small cabin lost to dreams, he smells like _choices_. and Peter thinks, _'Oh, it's him. It's got to be him.'_

* * *

Stiles was just... bored.

He gets bored, easily, okay? And he gets curious even easier, like, he's curious _all the time_ , about _everything_. And he's not above the morbid, macabre and ghoulish, in fact, it's that kind of stuff that gets him the most.

Maybe it's because of his dad's job, maybe it's the way his mother died screaming profanities at him, screeching at the top of her lungs that she didn't _know_ him, that he _wasn't_ her son, that humans don't give birth to _birds_ , and she _hated_ him. Maybe it's that, along with this weird feeling he gets in his gut sometimes, to search, to know, to keep all of the secrets he finds because all of the _people_ are temporary.

But the knowledge will stay.

As long as he is alive, the knowledge will stay.

Even if some of the secrets he learns threaten to swallow him whole, consume him with their depravity, with the loneliness and pain they bring.

He's afraid, terrified of losing those he loves, and he loves them all so _deeply_. He's been afraid since his mother died. Maybe even before then. So he keeps his father from drinking too much, makes damn sure the man stays true to a heart-healthy diet, and he _worries_ ; he keeps such a tight leash on Scott it amazes him sometimes that the boy is still friends with him at all, that he allows him his jealousy and his need and his want to be the _only one_ , because Scotty's so _good_ , too good, and Stiles _isn't_ , and if anyone realizes that they'll steal Scott away and Scott will figure it out, too.

Maybe taking Scott out in the middle of the night to satisfy his boredom and his curiosity, to go in search of half a body isn't the brightest idea but... Stiles isn't a very good friend, as has already been established. In fact, he can be an ass, is an ass, most days.

And then they hear them, the dogs, see the flashing lights, and Stiles already knows he's probably not going to get out of this without getting seriously grounded, so he's already mostly resigned, but he figures he at least ought to save _Scott_ from the same fate, so, last-minute, he decides to toss Scott the flashlight, tells him to run one way, _quietly_ , while he runs the other.

Only, Stiles never gets that far.

He'd _planned_ on romping around loudly and providing enough of a distraction for Scott to get away, well, _Scott-free_ , but he's barely stomped ten feet ahead when there's a heat behind him, a buzzing in the back of his head and a warring of his senses that's so strong it makes him dizzy.

One part of him screams: _Danger, danger, run!_

And another part, that feels older, and unfamiliar, it just hums, content, pleased, because this was what he'd been _born_ for.

To be the right decision that made up for the _wrong_ one all those years ago. And that... it doesn't make sense, at _all_ , but it knocks him breathless, keeps him still long enough for the thing behind him to pounce.

And then suddenly he's on the ground, keening on the edge of a whimper as sharp, terrifying teeth bury _deep_ into his side. Then, and it's odd, so odd, but the maw that had bitten leaves, only for a tongue to replace the sting, laving at the wound, and Stiles... he lets it happen.

He doesn't run, doesn't scream, doesn't fight. Just sighs against the dirt and the leaves underneath him, shivers as he feels the tongue shudder, change, and then the weight above him is both smaller and more firm, solid.

"Lítill guð," a familiar voice, rough with disuse, purrs, and Stiles' eyes open, something clicks in his brain, and memories start to rush in, "I've missed you. Missed you. _Love_ you. Ég elska þig með allri sálu minni, lítill guð."

Stiles trembles, gasps, tears slide down his burning cheeks as the floodgates in his mind open. He doesn't remember all of it, he'd never be able to, not with this human body, not with this human mind, that was his sacrifice. But he remembers enough.

He remembers his first master, the one who found twins, two little ravens, when the earth was still just _trees_ and _life_ and _new_. He remembers his brother, and how their master gave them gifts, how he worried for them, how his thirst for knowledge drove him, how he was always asking them to fly across the world to bring him _more_.

He remembers his brother dying, and his master beginning to fade away, and how he gave him one last gift, and the promise that he'd find another master someday, before he faded away entirely.

He remembers Peter, he remembers watching him grow and thinking, is this him? Is this who I will be devoting myself to?

And then, watching the wolf, sharp, strong, beautiful, glorious, he remembers falling hopelessly, helplessly, irrevocably in love. And he remembers fighting the Old Laws, the way they bound and cut into him as he tried to give warning. He remembers Peter's grief, how he ran away, after, how he hated and rejected and ignored. He remembers going to him, just once, to apologize and say goodbye before he...

Reincarnated wouldn't be the right word, not exactly, but it's close.

"I never liked you calling me that, you know. Dýrmæti úlfur," he breathes against the ground, and he can feel Peter rumble with a shaky sort of laughter above him.

"What would you have me call you then?" Peter asks, the same question he asked all those years ago, and Stiles sniffs, smiles, turns over with some difficulty. Peter is crouched there, above him, naked and filthy and covered in the scars the fire left him. Stiles frames his face with his hands, presses their foreheads together, breathes past the tears and the lump in his throat. In a tremulous voice, he answers:

"My name Muninn. But you can call me _Stiles_."

Peter takes a deep breath, kisses him sound and desperate and still half mad.

"Stiles," he says, and the raven grins.

* * *

Epilogue

The Alpha of Beacon Hills is a legend, when he walks as a wolf, he is a sand brown thing, large and sleek and beautiful, with his raven perched, riding, upon his back; when he walks as a man, his raven sits upon his shoulder, and when his raven, his _Beta_ , walks as a man, a _boy_ , he is easy to underestimate, but he knows every secret, every choice you've ever made, just by _looking_ at you.

They ravaged and reaped vengeance on those responsible for the Hale fire six years former, and decimated most of the Argent Clan for good measure. It is said that only two of that family still live, and even then, they have gone underground.

The Alpha acquires Beta's just as strong as his Mate, a Vampire by the name of Erica, a Banshee, a Kanima, two wolves he Bites, Boyd and Isaac, and one he doesn't, his nephew, Derek. Two Druids, Deaton and his apprentice, Scott. A human, a sheriff, the raven's father.

Their Pack is the most powerful the world has seen in a dog's age, armed with knowledge and people and love.

The raven will say to the wolf, "You are mad, but I've dealt with my fair share of mad Gods, and you're nowhere near as bad as Loki."

The wolf will say to the raven, "And you are a brat who flies off in random bouts of wanderlust without a moment's notice. Besides, I am a wolf, not a God, lítill guð."

"And I am but a raven, dýrmæti úlfur," the raven will say, and their Pack watches them, exasperated, fond, just the slightest bit intimidated.

And the raven and the wolf will smile.

And no one will dare threaten Beacon Hills again, not so long as it belongs to the Alpha and his Mate, but they will talk of it, and the two will become stories that survive long after they've died.

**Author's Note:**

> Did I know where this was going when I started it? Fuck no, lmfao, like, wtf are you doing Sumire?
> 
> (Ungi úlfur = Young wolf
> 
> Lítill guð = Little god
> 
> Fjandinn klár rass = Fucking smart ass
> 
> Dýrmæti úlfurinn minn/Dýrmæti úlfur = My precious wolf/Precious wolf
> 
> Ó elskan mín, dýrmæti úlfur = Oh, my darling, precious wolf
> 
> Ég elska þig með allri sálu minni = I love you with all my soul
> 
> Bíddu, ekki fara = Wait, don't leave)
> 
> If it wasn't clear, Huginn and Muninn are Odin's ravens in Norse Mythology and Icelandic is as close to old Norse as I could get so I went with it. I know fuck all about the language, so if I got something wrong, tell me and I'll fix it!!! I hope you enjoyed this fic! Muah, muah, muah!!!


End file.
